And from nowhere he just showed up, Mr. André, a guy from Canada, and as always in this country people speak to me in Hindi, or think I’m from Israel. Whatever, in some strange way we got into where we both came from, and his background sort of fascinated me, made me curious, born in New York, raised in Canada spent a couple of years in Indonesia and for the last eight years had been living in Israel. And of course I had to tell him the long boring story that I’m not from Sweden, originally from Chile, blah blah blah. Well, the point is that I finally found a really nice and funny guy who wants to travel with me.
Does the pope have an ugly hat?? Does Dolly Parton sleep on her back??
Of course was all I said. And after I puked myself tired (not from Mr. Food Poisoning, rather from cabin fever), I leave Pushkar after nine days for Udaipur, a small town which should be one of the most romantic towns in this country (not so fucking funny as a single guy, being smashed by the dark side of single life when you watch all disgusting quite and “sweetheart, I Love You SOOOOOO Much” couples choosing between pink or purple toilet paper in every store you enter).
Udaipur, a small, quiet town with few tourists makes it all feel a little better, and the bus trip that I took from Pushkar was just an ”incredibly fascinating” experience in itself. Sleeper Class cost me Rs 240 (40 Swedish crowns) and took eight hours. In something that looks like a box from the TV-show “På Spåret” they push you in and you’re expected to sleep throughout the trip. This English girl in the same box under me has some sort of claustrophobia so we talk for a while until I find two Valium, because since Mr. Food Poisoning’s visit, Mr. Sandman had obviously been in a BAD mood (probably from not getting laid last night) for right in the middle of our conversation I just pass out, like getting a fat bitch-slap.
Through Jitu’s help, I have the name of the hotel and as usual, the staff picks me up, and the room I get is just fantastic and the discount is even better, got it down from Rs 650 to Rs 200!! Window opening onto the garden and of course I let them open it because of the HEAT. What I didn’t know was what the garden belonged to a girl’s school, so out from the shower I’m jumping around in my birthday suit until I realized a sound that belongs to 12 years old girls laughing their asses of and ogling me until the limit where they pee their pants. If these girls didn’t have Anatomy as a subject, I would swear they had their first “live lecture”.
Morning starts with breakfast and the English girl, Galit shows up and we decide to do some sightseeing, starting with the totally meaningless city palace and the museum, which was almost as interesting as the three mosquito bites that my ass was tortured with on the ”incredibly fascinating” bus trip. After the palace we take a boat trip, that probably was one of the most funny things so far, and for economic reasons we decide to take one of the paddle boats and just paddle around the lake. In the middle of the lake there is a famous hotel (James Bond had shot one of his movies there, but who the fuck cares?) and it is surrounded by a “ private area” where tourists from “Lonely Planet hotels” are not allowed to enter, and just guess what we do! Simply paddle into the “private area” and while we both enjoying the beautiful sunset, a police boat comes up and directs us toward “our area of the lake” (fucking asshole). But nothing bad comes about without something good, and we had a nice and funny boat trip and an amazing sunset.
The next day we went downtown, checked out the spice market, went to a churchyard where they had buried a bunch of old maharajas, which was just as much fun as running around counterclockwise in a churchyard in Gothenburg. After dinner, we meet three Swedish girls and take another boat trip (not a paddle boat, that’s for sure) . The Swedish girls are one the way to Diu, and so am I, so I’m just waiting to catch up with these girls and freak out like Swedes do when they are abroad, and of course, get myself a nice fucking suntan!
There are moments in your life when you realize the meaning of life. For me, it’s just to live it and do something good about it. All these amazing, fantastic experiences that I’ve had so far on this trip, just give me so much strength and energy. Just spending a sleepless night on the rooftop, watching the sky and the stars, or just spending an hour an half in a store, talking with Indian people and drinking chai, having 256,984 kids running after Jitu’s ( NEW MOTORBIKE) trying to touch a tourist, which is one of the dreams an Indian kid has, giving away my school pens to other kids and seeing the happiness of getting a simple thing such as a school pen, giving away an old T-shirt to a beggar, sleeping for as long I can or two, no requirements, no obligations. All the people I meet, all the validation I get for my shaved head and my earrings as well just pacing around the city, all makes me feel so free and independent. Perhaps the happiest I’ve ever been.
André is going to Bombay for a date and I will hook up with him the next week. Suffering from cold, that made me lose almost all of my voice and my nose is running like an elephant pissing. I manage to forget my camera on the last boat trip we had; but a really nice Indian guy went back to the boat and found it for me; after that I forget my memory card at the internet café ( being the idiot I am, I discover it three hours later), but the nice guy at the place has is, so it turned out well. In three hours I will take another “incredibly fantastic” bus trip, but this time to Diu, and best of all it only takes 15 hours!! Do you think I fell excited about it?
If I don’t stop my writing, my nose is going to drip all over the keyboard and electrocute my face, and if I don’t stop coughing, I’ll blow a hole in the monitor. I’ll probably pee my pants too. Time to finish up here.
(Intro: Madonna: “How High”)
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Saturday, September 22, 2007
“I raise my hands to heaven of curiosity; I don’t know what to ask for. What has it got for me?”
And as usual, I’m late and the bus to Pushkar leaves in ten minutes and I’m still changing money, trying to find a liquor store to buy a bottle of whiskey as a present to the guys that will pick me up at the bus station. Stressed as hell, sweat stains under my arms, and a dry mouth that’s crying out for liquid relief, this Indian guy helps me to buy the ticket, takes my heavy backpack and manages to get my stupid ass on the bus just as it pulls out! Jitu is his name, and the guy picks me up with a garland and a placard with my name spelled so atrociously you can’t believe it, but I care as much as the enormous cow that is shitting just outside the local hairdresser.
Jitu, my new private guide and driver takes me as well to this nice hotel run by a family, where a night in a middle class room only cost 30 Swedish crowns. On his NEW motorbike (of which I am repeatedly reminded at least ten times a day) he shows me the sights around town. I have to say that he is a really nice guy, didn’t ask me for any kind of money regarding the sightseeing that we were doing; the only thing I had to pay for was the petrol. But of course I tip him in between (like buying him a banana cake!)
Having seen the most incredible sunset up at a temple in the mountains, fed even more monkeys, driven around in the desert and out in the villages, and seen the abjectly poor people and what’s comes with it, shitty, dirty, poverty, it is so unfamiliar to me, compared to what I have back home. Another Rajastani Festival (just like The “Pee And Poo Festival” in Gothenburg, but without langos and teenage drunkenness!), bumped right into a big fat cow in the middle of the night (first of all it was dark, and second, yes, I’d had a couple of beers). No more explanations, thank you very much! Heard Bah Bah Black Sheep played by two kids out in the desert with something that looked like a fiddle. I thought of how Jitu could overcome his fear of water in a very simple way: forcing him on a boat trip, and believe it or not, taught myself to eat breakfast at the same time!
Pushkar, a small town with a holy lake (in which all Indians happily bathe) is just so much easier to handle compared to the big cities. The people are just so friendly and kind, and you can, believe it or not, go into to a store without being harassed and get yourself out of there with your brain intact and without losing your patience, just because you don’t want to buy a fucking stone for Rs 5000, or a T-shirt of “good quality” that as soon as you put it in the plastic bag, it mutates into a dishrag.
But of course there are some assholes here as well, which I had the opportunity to meet. A so-called “priest” all of a sudden came up to me, managed to con me, dragged me down to the holy lake to do a “puja” (which is a sort of Hindu prayer for your family, basically meaning that the bigger your family, the emptier your wallet!) This hash smoking “priest” just forced med down to the lake, starting the “ritual” by putting a bunch of flowers in my hand; I tried to get myself out of the situation by telling him that I’m still suffering from Mr. Food Poisoning, and that I had to get back to the room before there a “tacky accident” occurred, but this guy did not buy it at all, grabbed my arm and took me to the holy lake to perform his ritual. Well fortunately, one of Jitu’s friends sees what’s going on, runs down and saves me. The thing is that we talked earlier about doing this “puja” at some point that evening. I then had the privilege to meet Viru, (whom after that became my own private guru) so I recognized him. There are just so many tourists that have been ripped off badly by these so-called priests, so I guess that I was just lucky.
The next morning I bumped into the fucking stupid holy priest, and he was so angry, and told me that I owed him money just because he didn’t have the chance to complete his “holy ritual”. My ritual with this asshole would simply be, as the anesthetizing nurse I am, to sedate him with cow shit, and then invite family and friends for a big fucking barbeque party!)
The benefit of hanging out with the local guys like Jitu is that you don’t have to overpay or get ripped off in every store you enter (basically, I point out what I want, Jitu buys it for me, with my money). A fat crummy tourist (being so fat, it isn’t necessary to ask where he was from) got “sort of” angry when we both bought almost the same silver ring (his size was just a wee bit bigger than mine, and I swear that I could have used it as a cock-ring!!) When it became clear to him that he paid so much more than I did, I saw that being twice as big can cost twice as much.
One day I thought I deserved some “pampering”, like getting my head shaved, maybe getting a manicure as well as pedicure, so what I do is try to find an Indian “salon”, which I finally succeeded in doing. There, this polite man in the reception shows me to the chair. A young guy, lying in one of the chairs is ogling me as I sit down, and it turns out that HE is the one that is going to shave my head (a fucking 12 year old practitioner with his parents studying their son’s training progress) I got my head cut to ribbons, and it took that little bastard an hour and a half just to shave my head!! I swear to God, if this little kid had done the rest of my “pampering” I would have ended up without fingers and toes! So he just did the head (God Bless Gilette’s MACH-3).
Pushkar is definitely the best place so far, compared to the big cities: quiet, peaceful, awesome rooftop restaurants with good food where you drink your beer well hidden in a big mug, just because it’s not legal to drink alcohol in Pushkar. The beers are served in coffee mugs and the bottle is hidden in your bag. Amazing to drink beer at a restaurant as a 30 years old man, in a way that makes you feel like you’re 15 again. You don’t get younger than you are, no matter how old you grow. Since Mr. Food Poisoning’s happy days, there has not been much drinking, but Jitu managed to get me a bottle of gin, so, here I am, back on stage!
Don’t know where I’m headed next, stuck here in some ways but so far, I’m having the time of my life, enjoying every minute of this trip and all the experiences that I am having. The only thing I know is that I’m going to have beer under the table at my hotel and maybe kill at least 300 mosquitoes that want to eat me!
Keep writing to me! You’re all in my heart. And don’t do anything that I wouldn’t do, OK!
(Intro: The Knife: Marble House”)
Jitu, my new private guide and driver takes me as well to this nice hotel run by a family, where a night in a middle class room only cost 30 Swedish crowns. On his NEW motorbike (of which I am repeatedly reminded at least ten times a day) he shows me the sights around town. I have to say that he is a really nice guy, didn’t ask me for any kind of money regarding the sightseeing that we were doing; the only thing I had to pay for was the petrol. But of course I tip him in between (like buying him a banana cake!)
Having seen the most incredible sunset up at a temple in the mountains, fed even more monkeys, driven around in the desert and out in the villages, and seen the abjectly poor people and what’s comes with it, shitty, dirty, poverty, it is so unfamiliar to me, compared to what I have back home. Another Rajastani Festival (just like The “Pee And Poo Festival” in Gothenburg, but without langos and teenage drunkenness!), bumped right into a big fat cow in the middle of the night (first of all it was dark, and second, yes, I’d had a couple of beers). No more explanations, thank you very much! Heard Bah Bah Black Sheep played by two kids out in the desert with something that looked like a fiddle. I thought of how Jitu could overcome his fear of water in a very simple way: forcing him on a boat trip, and believe it or not, taught myself to eat breakfast at the same time!
Pushkar, a small town with a holy lake (in which all Indians happily bathe) is just so much easier to handle compared to the big cities. The people are just so friendly and kind, and you can, believe it or not, go into to a store without being harassed and get yourself out of there with your brain intact and without losing your patience, just because you don’t want to buy a fucking stone for Rs 5000, or a T-shirt of “good quality” that as soon as you put it in the plastic bag, it mutates into a dishrag.
But of course there are some assholes here as well, which I had the opportunity to meet. A so-called “priest” all of a sudden came up to me, managed to con me, dragged me down to the holy lake to do a “puja” (which is a sort of Hindu prayer for your family, basically meaning that the bigger your family, the emptier your wallet!) This hash smoking “priest” just forced med down to the lake, starting the “ritual” by putting a bunch of flowers in my hand; I tried to get myself out of the situation by telling him that I’m still suffering from Mr. Food Poisoning, and that I had to get back to the room before there a “tacky accident” occurred, but this guy did not buy it at all, grabbed my arm and took me to the holy lake to perform his ritual. Well fortunately, one of Jitu’s friends sees what’s going on, runs down and saves me. The thing is that we talked earlier about doing this “puja” at some point that evening. I then had the privilege to meet Viru, (whom after that became my own private guru) so I recognized him. There are just so many tourists that have been ripped off badly by these so-called priests, so I guess that I was just lucky.
The next morning I bumped into the fucking stupid holy priest, and he was so angry, and told me that I owed him money just because he didn’t have the chance to complete his “holy ritual”. My ritual with this asshole would simply be, as the anesthetizing nurse I am, to sedate him with cow shit, and then invite family and friends for a big fucking barbeque party!)
The benefit of hanging out with the local guys like Jitu is that you don’t have to overpay or get ripped off in every store you enter (basically, I point out what I want, Jitu buys it for me, with my money). A fat crummy tourist (being so fat, it isn’t necessary to ask where he was from) got “sort of” angry when we both bought almost the same silver ring (his size was just a wee bit bigger than mine, and I swear that I could have used it as a cock-ring!!) When it became clear to him that he paid so much more than I did, I saw that being twice as big can cost twice as much.
One day I thought I deserved some “pampering”, like getting my head shaved, maybe getting a manicure as well as pedicure, so what I do is try to find an Indian “salon”, which I finally succeeded in doing. There, this polite man in the reception shows me to the chair. A young guy, lying in one of the chairs is ogling me as I sit down, and it turns out that HE is the one that is going to shave my head (a fucking 12 year old practitioner with his parents studying their son’s training progress) I got my head cut to ribbons, and it took that little bastard an hour and a half just to shave my head!! I swear to God, if this little kid had done the rest of my “pampering” I would have ended up without fingers and toes! So he just did the head (God Bless Gilette’s MACH-3).
Pushkar is definitely the best place so far, compared to the big cities: quiet, peaceful, awesome rooftop restaurants with good food where you drink your beer well hidden in a big mug, just because it’s not legal to drink alcohol in Pushkar. The beers are served in coffee mugs and the bottle is hidden in your bag. Amazing to drink beer at a restaurant as a 30 years old man, in a way that makes you feel like you’re 15 again. You don’t get younger than you are, no matter how old you grow. Since Mr. Food Poisoning’s happy days, there has not been much drinking, but Jitu managed to get me a bottle of gin, so, here I am, back on stage!
Don’t know where I’m headed next, stuck here in some ways but so far, I’m having the time of my life, enjoying every minute of this trip and all the experiences that I am having. The only thing I know is that I’m going to have beer under the table at my hotel and maybe kill at least 300 mosquitoes that want to eat me!
Keep writing to me! You’re all in my heart. And don’t do anything that I wouldn’t do, OK!
(Intro: The Knife: Marble House”)
Wednesday, September 19, 2007
“Let’s make it happen, boy; it’s in the air, I’d sell my soul for this to last forever”
And finally I have the privilege of meeting Mr. Food Poisoning, oh happy days! OK, well let’s get this straight, and for your edification, I can tell you the story about the young man who has seen directly into the brown eye of tourist diarrhea! Just after that I arrived at the “well-spoken” hotel with the whiskey-thirsty Indians, where we all had mutton in a party mood, like nothing else, the following morning started with sightseeing in a rickshaw, including temples, and the second one was just same as the first, and all of a sudden I get this really strange feeling in the abdominal region. Get a bit worried, and after that, I am forced into jewelry shop, spending an hour there, “where they only wanted to sell things for the benefit of poor people in the city” and thereafter, a camel ride that made me feel like my ass was still on the camel long after getting off (like when you wash your mouth with Listerine, everything disappears: your teeth, mouth, gums, tongue, just about everything), I manage to forget about my stomach and am just wondering if the nerve damage from the camel ride could be irreversible. Whatever… as evening falls, I “try to expunge the bacteria from my body” with a gin & tonic (just a small one).
Night comes, bringing with it the full effects of the food poisoning. Jesus fuck, I was so FUCKING SICK. For THREE WHOLE FUCKING DAYS I lay in the strangest and most hilarious positions, trying to avoid the stomach cramps, turning myself upside down in the toilet, turning all of hope of getting rid of the stomach cramps.
The friendly Indians got a little bit of scared by the time they found me, lying on the floor trying to call the reception for some water. The first thing that they want to do was to get me in to a hospital, which I refused. I asked them to get me some antibiotics from the closest pharmacy and as quickly as possible, which they fortunately did.
And they did it all: they the nursed me throughout the days I was sick, gave me cold towels (to reduce my fever every other hour) and of course got me the antibiotics that I asked for. And it all turned out well quite, with some help from the medications: Lexinor, Ciproxin, Paracetamol, Stesolide and of course Lopermaid, but I have to tell you the story about the “holy man” that they called “Mr. Guru” whom I meet on a late Friday and who told me that my chakra was unbalanced and offered me the purchase of a fucking stone for Rs 5000 , which would immediately get me in a better shape!!
“Sweetheart, just keep that little stone, I’ll survive without it” was all I said, and in fetal position, lying inside a highly pregnant mother, back I went by rickshaw. It’s not my chakra that that is unbalanced, it’s my stomach, you idiot.
Back on stage, I was able to see some more interesting things, even though my adnominal region remained unbalanced (there was a little “accident” in one of all the holy temples I saw; not so great for my karma).
In my confusion of being exhausted by Mr. Food Poisoning, I saw myself as one of the candidates for “The 2007 World Travelers’ Tourist Diarrhea Award”.
“And the nominees are:
1. Mr. Mikael, for shitting his pants in a holy temple somewhere in Jaipur
2. Mr. “Jalla Jalla” for finally getting his long-term diarrhea into a chronic state
3. Ms. Tiffany Persson for constantly misusing laxative drugs
4. Mr. DJ Bobo for actually looking like a splash of diarrhea himself
The winner goes to……………Mr. Mikael (of course)…
Whatever. Back on stage I fed monkeys in just another temple up in the mountains, bought myself a Tony Manero suit, (Saturday Night Fever), which I’ll probably never use, bought even more silver jewelry, had dinner at a real Indian McDonald’s, visited a Rajastani festival, where I danced my ass off and got famous at the dance floor (they even thought I was a Bollywood star; the validation just thrilled me), ate toast and water for a week, cleaned the whole hotel room with an antiseptic that I stole from my job just to be sure of that would be no trace of Mr. Food Poisoning after finally banishing him, washed my hands manically just before every meal I had, called my dad like an coward when I thought I was going to die because of Mr. Food Poisoning, and sent back half of what was in my backpack by parcel post. Who the fuck is so stupid to bring 35 pairs of underwear (even though it is Dolce & Gabbana), ten pairs of socks, 20 tank tops, all white, (bright thing to bring to a country like India) and finally got myself by local bus to Pushkar!
(Intro: The Though Alliance; “Make It Happen”)
Night comes, bringing with it the full effects of the food poisoning. Jesus fuck, I was so FUCKING SICK. For THREE WHOLE FUCKING DAYS I lay in the strangest and most hilarious positions, trying to avoid the stomach cramps, turning myself upside down in the toilet, turning all of hope of getting rid of the stomach cramps.
The friendly Indians got a little bit of scared by the time they found me, lying on the floor trying to call the reception for some water. The first thing that they want to do was to get me in to a hospital, which I refused. I asked them to get me some antibiotics from the closest pharmacy and as quickly as possible, which they fortunately did.
And they did it all: they the nursed me throughout the days I was sick, gave me cold towels (to reduce my fever every other hour) and of course got me the antibiotics that I asked for. And it all turned out well quite, with some help from the medications: Lexinor, Ciproxin, Paracetamol, Stesolide and of course Lopermaid, but I have to tell you the story about the “holy man” that they called “Mr. Guru” whom I meet on a late Friday and who told me that my chakra was unbalanced and offered me the purchase of a fucking stone for Rs 5000 , which would immediately get me in a better shape!!
“Sweetheart, just keep that little stone, I’ll survive without it” was all I said, and in fetal position, lying inside a highly pregnant mother, back I went by rickshaw. It’s not my chakra that that is unbalanced, it’s my stomach, you idiot.
Back on stage, I was able to see some more interesting things, even though my adnominal region remained unbalanced (there was a little “accident” in one of all the holy temples I saw; not so great for my karma).
In my confusion of being exhausted by Mr. Food Poisoning, I saw myself as one of the candidates for “The 2007 World Travelers’ Tourist Diarrhea Award”.
“And the nominees are:
1. Mr. Mikael, for shitting his pants in a holy temple somewhere in Jaipur
2. Mr. “Jalla Jalla” for finally getting his long-term diarrhea into a chronic state
3. Ms. Tiffany Persson for constantly misusing laxative drugs
4. Mr. DJ Bobo for actually looking like a splash of diarrhea himself
The winner goes to……………Mr. Mikael (of course)…
Whatever. Back on stage I fed monkeys in just another temple up in the mountains, bought myself a Tony Manero suit, (Saturday Night Fever), which I’ll probably never use, bought even more silver jewelry, had dinner at a real Indian McDonald’s, visited a Rajastani festival, where I danced my ass off and got famous at the dance floor (they even thought I was a Bollywood star; the validation just thrilled me), ate toast and water for a week, cleaned the whole hotel room with an antiseptic that I stole from my job just to be sure of that would be no trace of Mr. Food Poisoning after finally banishing him, washed my hands manically just before every meal I had, called my dad like an coward when I thought I was going to die because of Mr. Food Poisoning, and sent back half of what was in my backpack by parcel post. Who the fuck is so stupid to bring 35 pairs of underwear (even though it is Dolce & Gabbana), ten pairs of socks, 20 tank tops, all white, (bright thing to bring to a country like India) and finally got myself by local bus to Pushkar!
(Intro: The Though Alliance; “Make It Happen”)
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
"No Place to be Ending but Somewhere to Start"
With a feeling of loneliness that confused me to no end, I escaped from Delhi to Agra, petrified in anticipation of the train trip, which turned out to be about as dangerous as shitting in a Swedish toilet (i.e. it was just fine). The nice rickshaw driver happily drives me to a hotel, which affords me the best view of the Taj Mahal. He wants to show the city and…… Starting the next morning, I get up at 5.30 (when the hell did I do something like that the last time…?)
The word for Taj Mahal is AMAZING!
A photographer quickly comes up to me and wants to takes photos in front of one of the Great Wonders of the World. Sure; one picture is always good to have. The manic photographer follows me ever step I take, and after running myself so sweaty and repeatedly saying NO to more photos, I manage to escape, jump right into the building, and all of a sudden a “guide” appears, just waiting for me. Hmm….smoked a cigarette (like kids do in high school toilets), and then the merry-go-round got going. Before I even got his name, he asked for some money, and wanted me to pay for the guided tour, and even showed me his so-called “Guide’s License”.
“Look Mister, is that an elephant?” is all I say, and meanwhile, as he turns around, I take a running start and jump right out of the building and leap two steps out of this Wonder of the World, and scorch my feet on the burning marble, yet I manage to get myself to the entrance. And just guess who’s waiting, with an evil smile …… the photographer!
One photo turned out to be 26, which should have cost me about Rs 2600 (approximately 450 Swedish crowns). After half an hour of heated discussion, cursing vividly, mostly in Swedish, I decide to buy ten of the pictures……. Oh, whatever!
My happy taxi driver, Ali, drives me around the city and shows me all the sites, while not asking for any money, gives me a fresh perspective on Indian people. He calls me “Mr. Bollywood Son” and promises me that he will arrange the train trip the following day to Jaipur, where his friends would pick me up at the train station.
And yes, he did it all, bought my ticket, arranging it so that I would be free of problems regarding annoying rickshaw drivers who just want to rip you off upon arrival. Two REALLY drunk rickshaw drivers pick me up at the train station in the middle of the night where I’m surrounded by rickshaw drivers that are basically ogling me and I don’t know how to get rid of them. Got myself to the hotel; Ali had promised me that when I arrived, there would be two cold beers waiting for me, and there they were. The people that I met so far are just so friendly and polite and my perspective of Indians changes from something bad to something good, which really surprises me, in a very positive way. The drunk Indians buy me more beer, and somehow the drunkenness goes way beyond what it should be, and I’m trying to say good night, but they only answer me in Hindi, and all I can do laugh about the whole situation and put myself in the place where I belong at this moment …. in bed!
(Intro: Sade; “Smooth Operator”)
The word for Taj Mahal is AMAZING!
A photographer quickly comes up to me and wants to takes photos in front of one of the Great Wonders of the World. Sure; one picture is always good to have. The manic photographer follows me ever step I take, and after running myself so sweaty and repeatedly saying NO to more photos, I manage to escape, jump right into the building, and all of a sudden a “guide” appears, just waiting for me. Hmm….smoked a cigarette (like kids do in high school toilets), and then the merry-go-round got going. Before I even got his name, he asked for some money, and wanted me to pay for the guided tour, and even showed me his so-called “Guide’s License”.
“Look Mister, is that an elephant?” is all I say, and meanwhile, as he turns around, I take a running start and jump right out of the building and leap two steps out of this Wonder of the World, and scorch my feet on the burning marble, yet I manage to get myself to the entrance. And just guess who’s waiting, with an evil smile …… the photographer!
One photo turned out to be 26, which should have cost me about Rs 2600 (approximately 450 Swedish crowns). After half an hour of heated discussion, cursing vividly, mostly in Swedish, I decide to buy ten of the pictures……. Oh, whatever!
My happy taxi driver, Ali, drives me around the city and shows me all the sites, while not asking for any money, gives me a fresh perspective on Indian people. He calls me “Mr. Bollywood Son” and promises me that he will arrange the train trip the following day to Jaipur, where his friends would pick me up at the train station.
And yes, he did it all, bought my ticket, arranging it so that I would be free of problems regarding annoying rickshaw drivers who just want to rip you off upon arrival. Two REALLY drunk rickshaw drivers pick me up at the train station in the middle of the night where I’m surrounded by rickshaw drivers that are basically ogling me and I don’t know how to get rid of them. Got myself to the hotel; Ali had promised me that when I arrived, there would be two cold beers waiting for me, and there they were. The people that I met so far are just so friendly and polite and my perspective of Indians changes from something bad to something good, which really surprises me, in a very positive way. The drunk Indians buy me more beer, and somehow the drunkenness goes way beyond what it should be, and I’m trying to say good night, but they only answer me in Hindi, and all I can do laugh about the whole situation and put myself in the place where I belong at this moment …. in bed!
(Intro: Sade; “Smooth Operator”)
Thursday, September 6, 2007
I was Happy in the Haze of a Drunken Hour
////… and tipsy from gin and on my way, and with a sweaty body, naked in a hotel room where the heat is 32 degrees, I suddenly wake up in the middle of the night and I can’t understand how the hell it could be that hot; I’m trying to get back to sleep, but with two Israelis fucking next door, I feel like grabbing my expensive Teva sandals and throwing them against the wall to try to make them realize that it’s both too hot and too late for what being subjected to their annoying copulation.
And from the haze, this young man wakes up at 2 PM, panicking, realizing that he now missed the ordered taxi that was supposed to guide him throughout the city. Motherfuck! Had made a promise to a stupid Indian guy that I would be standing drowned in perfume and freshly shaved at 8:30 for a full day, with a private guide and the works.
Is there an insurance company here somewhere? Do they cover instances of being late, or should I fill out the ”Fuck It All” form? Or should I put myself in quarantine for a week or so?
The zit my nose is bigger than a Jewish beach ball ……. And I drown it with my acne solution and get myself in a rickshaw that takes me downtown, just pacing around, buying an awful Indian kurta just because the stupid Indian convinced me to; bought another pair of shorts, found a pair of really awesome sunglasses from PRADA, which I of course I buy, and immediately regret the purchase, return them, run from the shop in hopes that I will find a Santa Claus beard so no one can recognize me! Jump in to an expensive bar in Delhi, order a beer and discover that I lost my ticket to Agra for the next morning.
Mikael, you are going to win the “The Most Stupid Traveler Of The Year” award.
“… Thank you….thank you soo much. First of I would like to thank my stupid little brain. Can I say hi to my family? I owe it all to the grace of God.”
Back on stage, in the Main Bazaar, I find myself drinking beer at the only place in the area that serves it. Two Japanese guys with a seriously nasty case of verbal diarrhea are talking my ears off and I escape back to my hotel, where I’m now sitting and drooling over a banana cake two meters away.
Next mission: buy the banana cake, have a good wank, and then maybe a late episode of Bollbompa.
(Intro: The Smiths:” Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now”)
And from the haze, this young man wakes up at 2 PM, panicking, realizing that he now missed the ordered taxi that was supposed to guide him throughout the city. Motherfuck! Had made a promise to a stupid Indian guy that I would be standing drowned in perfume and freshly shaved at 8:30 for a full day, with a private guide and the works.
Is there an insurance company here somewhere? Do they cover instances of being late, or should I fill out the ”Fuck It All” form? Or should I put myself in quarantine for a week or so?
The zit my nose is bigger than a Jewish beach ball ……. And I drown it with my acne solution and get myself in a rickshaw that takes me downtown, just pacing around, buying an awful Indian kurta just because the stupid Indian convinced me to; bought another pair of shorts, found a pair of really awesome sunglasses from PRADA, which I of course I buy, and immediately regret the purchase, return them, run from the shop in hopes that I will find a Santa Claus beard so no one can recognize me! Jump in to an expensive bar in Delhi, order a beer and discover that I lost my ticket to Agra for the next morning.
Mikael, you are going to win the “The Most Stupid Traveler Of The Year” award.
“… Thank you….thank you soo much. First of I would like to thank my stupid little brain. Can I say hi to my family? I owe it all to the grace of God.”
Back on stage, in the Main Bazaar, I find myself drinking beer at the only place in the area that serves it. Two Japanese guys with a seriously nasty case of verbal diarrhea are talking my ears off and I escape back to my hotel, where I’m now sitting and drooling over a banana cake two meters away.
Next mission: buy the banana cake, have a good wank, and then maybe a late episode of Bollbompa.
(Intro: The Smiths:” Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now”)
Tuesday, September 4, 2007
I’ve been a fool of lifetime but today I’ll be the king
“Ladies and gentlemen!
Thank you for coming to my little show”
Not being quite drunk enough, I somehow managed to get on the flight within 12 minutes of takeoff, and with the help of being paged (repeatedly) at the airport, got myself onboard. This would first take me to Helsinki. I happily ordered further beers to sort of escape the realization of what the hell I was getting myself into.
A Polish girl on the right side combined with a German guy beside her was the guest with whom I would spend the next 8 hours. The German guy had nasty verbal diarrhea, and let all his drivel pour out freely. Meanwhile, the Polish girl asked me to wake her so she wouldn’t forget to take her medication. Demonstratively, I put on my iPod and raised the volume and I can’t say that I’ve enjoyed Indian beer as much before or since (even though half of its contents is sugar)!
A Swedish guy accosted me at the airport in Delhi and asked me if we could split a cab to the city. If? Are you kidding? No way would I put myself into a cab, or rickshaw in the middle of the night on my own! Thankfully, I got to the hotel that I had booked in advance and the just felt so fucking happy that had arrived safe and sound. I celebrated with a (sort of) small gin and tonic, tried to turn the TV on, but like the AC, it, like so many things in India, was out of order. It was only 29 degrees in the room so I was just excited enough to get to sleep in the heat with a fan from 1798! By Jove, that was long before the electrical age! This foreshadowed so many of my experiences in India: the primitive right alongside the super-modern.
With a certain childlike excitement that Delhi would look as same as the last time I had been here (ten years ago) I thought I would be able to handle all the harassing Indian touts. At one moment, they would try to sell me trips to Kashmir, and then offer me hash and marijuana, and at the very next second, all other kinds of drugs. You name it. It was on offer. The first one, a well dressed Indian guy “who only wanted to practice his English and had no interest in my money” convinced me to let him show me the way to “the only authorized tourist information” in the city. Hmm…..sure… After 25 minutes of walking in the most obviously wrong direction, I quickly realized that the further we walked the more likely I would end up in an abandoned, dilapidated hovel with 25 screaming Indians that would constantly try to sell my a trip to Kashmir, or other parts of north India I really had to see the (which I eventually did on my own initiative). Nevertheless, I managed to get myself out of there, luckily without spending any money. I changed hotels the next day in hopes of meeting other crazy backpackers and ended up in Main Bazaar where I write this sitting, in sweat and budding zits, manifestly confused. This city is so fucking annoying, but in all the chaos and irritation, there is a certain structure where everything miraculously and illogically works. It is nothing short of fascinating. Yesterday I had dinner with four rabbits. They were right beside me, looking at me as I tried to understand what the hell I had ordered. It ended up being the most tasteless noodle thing I had ever had the displeasure of eating.
Spending the day endlessly pacing around the streets, talking to Indians about what Sweden is like, saying no to 852,415,454 trips to the northern part of India, drinking gin and tonic with the manager at the hotel, studying the cows from my window. I even found the Don’t Pass Me By restaurant where Gunilla and I always had breakfast on our trip ten years ago.
I bought myself a train ticket to Agra, shaved my head, and got a facial, just because the Indian guy thought I had a bad skin (Hey, what’s the matter? What do you expect in a smoggy in a city like this, asshole?!) In the event, he gave me a bill for Rs. 600, ripping me off big time. I looked at to a nice girl, had more gin, and spent plenty of time at the internet café, only to realize that I’m actually here. For ten years I’ve been waiting for this journey. Now I’m fucking doing it.
Will stay here until tomorrow, then I’ll head down to Agra and then further south.
BONKSISTER … I LOVE YOU! Thanks for the breakfast, the morning drunk, and the painting. I will keep it throughout my journey.
FREDDAN, BAGGEN, MARTEN, YOU GUYS MADE THE BEST OF MY LAST NIGHT IN SWEDEN!
(Intro: Caesars Palace: “Let my freak flag fly”)
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